Changing the Appearence of the Dock and Icons on the Desktop,

[Xander562]

Hey, i'm relatively new to the mac so help me out, I was looking at some people's desktops in the Pictures part of this forum and noticed their Dock doesnt look like mine. Also such icons as "Macintosh HD" etc. looked different than mine. Can anyone tell me where is a good place to download new icons and docks and how to install them?

 

[Jaffa Cake]

There are a lot of sites offering icons for download – The Iconfactory and David Lanham's site are a couple of good places to start. Once you've selected the icons you want to use...

1. Select the icon you want to change your folder, app or file to.
2. Choose "Get Info" from the File Menu, or click command-I.
3. Click the icon in the upper left of the info window.
4. Choose "Copy" from the Edit menu (or type command-C).
5. Select your folder, app or file on the desktop and "Get Info" for it.
6. Click the icon in the upper left of the info window.
7. Select "Paste" (command-V) from the Edit Menu.

...and your icon should be changed. For system wide changes, and to change icons like Trash that you can't change manually without messing about with files hidden away on your hard drive, you might like to take a look at CandyBar.

 

[Kardashian]

As Jaffa Cake said, to change icons, CandyBar is your best bet, or ShapeShifter (however this also changes, well, everything about your Mac - colour schemes, wallpapers, system wide themes).

You can download icon 'packs' and choose which ones you want to install. You can revert back to the original icon by dragging it off the current icon in CandyBar. I wouldn't recommend the Command + I option, as I did this to ALL my system icons back when I first started using a Mac, and it took HOURS to complete, and HOURS to reverse.

Also, to change your dock, download ClearDock 1.3. It can make your dock clear, as the name says, or let you recolour it - the shadow colour, the outline, the dock itself, and the arrows under open applications.

I love it set to clear, but at the moment, I have changed it to a mid-graphite setting, with a white border and white arrows, it looks very nice against my desktop.

Good luck personalising your new Mac, buddy.